Season 17, Episode 7: Ranger Red

"Ranger Red"

Episode 7

Air Date: April 11th, 2009

Let's be real, as consistently awesome as Power Rangers RPM has been, it's story has been extremely lite on the main trio of rangers: Scott, Flynn and Summer.  It's not a bad thing really, actually it's incredibly refreshing having a story narrative mainly focusing on the Black Ranger and to a lesser extent again, the Green Ranger.  So far, while not bland or boring in the least, we don't really haven't gotten a sense of who these three are, their backstories or their motivations of being rangers outside of their brief moments before the 1 Year jump and they are revealed to be Power Rangers. Luckily, we reach the part of the season that begins focusing heavily on each rangers' origins that lead them to become rangers as well as their flaws, insecurities and struggles they are currently still dealing with outside of....you know....saving humanity from possible extinction. O_O Scott's been your typical fearless leader, skeptical of Dillon's trustworthiness and well as his attitude toward Dr. K, not to mention seeing Dillon as a rival in terms of strength, leadership and pure machnoness. lol But here we learn what really drives Scott as leader of the team, especially considering he wasn't even seen as the best of what Corinth had to offer in terms of defenses. We learn finally who Eagle 1 was who died in the premiere and it turns out it was Scott's brother Marcus, who were both fighter pilots under their dad Colonel Truman.  Clearly there is some apparent favoritism among the brothers, at least through Scott's point of view and it's hard NOT to see why. Colonel Truman is so eager to compliment and support Marcus while having doubts about Scott's capabilities of being just as good, which is pretty harsh but considering their a military family under the very surreal threat of apocalypse, I can understand why Truman wouldn't want Scott in the line of fire like Marcus since he even couldn't maintain his cool during a simulation of an aerial attack.

This feeds into the present day conflict when the rangers are tracking down yet another Venjix attack but when trying to use a new zord developed by Dr. K, it malfunctions and causes a major accident that involves them having to save multiple potential causalities as massive amounts of debris fall on the city after a tower is destroyed.  Apparently, the zord malfunctioned do to Dr. K. MAKING. A. MISTAKE!!! O_O A mentor with flaws again...NO!!! But it turns out, all they need to fix the problem is getting a Remote Flux Overthruster Core Reactor (Oh boy, mouthful again! O_O) that is outside the city and only Scott knows the location of.  Scott wants to go and get the reactor but will need the coordinates of where his brother's plane was shot down but Colonel Truman is adamant about him NOT going as he can't handle it as he brings up the death of his son.  Scott decides to take matters into his own hands and steals the coordinates from Hicks, the right hand man of the Colonel we've been falling so far this season.  As Scott makes his way outside the city, the rangers are alerted to him leaving but Dr. K tells them she let him go to their shock and agitation.  Back in the past, we see the reactor was being used during the battle of Corinth in Marcus' flyer just as Scott was once again getting nervous about the upcoming fight.  Doesn't help that his father didn't want him to take the front line of the defense like Marcus.  Jesus, if things couldn't get ANY worse, We soon learn more from an old audio that Marcus was killed during the battle of Corinth as he and Scott were shot down.  Scott survived of course and ran into Summer after his plan went down as she quickly tended to his wound and headed straight the Corinth before the shields closed. You know one thing I truly enjoying about the story telling this season is how interconnected the backstories are to what came to be in the premiere from Dillon running into Ziggy to how Summer and Scott got together and barely made back to Corinth.  It's really refreshing and neat! :)

Back outside the city, Scott finds the area of where his brother was killed and gets the reactor....as well as a confidential letter his father gave Marcus on choosing a second squadron leader since his dad was so hard on him about not being able to stand alongside his brother. But before we get more into that, Scott is suddenly discovered by an Attackbot and Grinders as he fights his way back to the city; even with an old missile.  Badass!!! But when it looks like he won't make, Colonel Truman and his soldiers fire at the Grinders to save him as well as get back into the city.  He gives the reactor to his father to give to Dr. K and quickly dismisses his father's comparison to his brother for once before morphing and fighting off the incoming attackers.  Flynn and Summer soon arrive to help as they combine their weapons and fire the Road Blaster to put the Attackbot offline.  Venjix commences yet another download and the rangers must now face him with their zords.  Luckily, Dr. K got the reactor in time and uses it to reboot the new zord for Ziggy and Dillon to pilot.  It looks ridiculous of course, especially when combined to create the VavleMax Megazord, but it gets the job done immediately in destroying the Attackbot as well as incoming drones attacking the city again.  As the episode concludes, we see that confidential letter with the recommendation Marcus had for his father....and it turns out it was for Scott, his brother.......TITLE CARD!!! 

Once again, an all around excellent episode, tho I must admit, I thought we were in for our first stinker this season with that horrendous opening scene of Scott using a baby carriage with a baby in it to fight off some Grinders. -_-  Seriously, WTF!?? What is with this show and babies in baby carriages!!?? Doesn't help when Ziggy is fumbling around and using the mom as a means to fight off the Grinders as well.  Yeah, I know it was suppose to be all tongue in cheek, but........bad writing there! For me at least! :)

Final Morph: A-